The Jansens give chase, which is fucking stupid considering they’re on foot.
I weigh my options. I can get out of the tractor and make a run for it, or I can stay down and hope they’re too lazy to clean up the mess right now.
When I see the oldest one take a swig out of a tall boy can of beer, I opt to lie low. If I were a beer or two deep, I’d leave this mess until morning.
“I hate those Eaton motherfuckers.” Lance Jansen kicks a rock.
“Should we move the tractor?” the younger one asks. I can’t even remember his name. He’s younger than me, where Lance was in my grade.
“Nah. Fuck that. I’m parking this here every goddamn day from now on. Just knowing it pisses them off is win enough.”
I tilt my head. He has a point. Not that I’m about to say anything. I stay hidden until their chatter dies down, and once I’m sure they’re gone, I finish doing the inside.
And I do it real good. I mean, I cover that shit from top to bottom. Then, I hop out and make my way over the hill, checking over my shoulder now and then to make sure those hillbilly motherfuckers don’t come back for me. Someone smart would realize there were three horses and only two people.
But Lance and his brother are not that someone.
Spring is in the air, and I’m not even mad about the walk. I get lost in my thoughts about my rides this weekend. We leave tomorrow, and I need to get my head in the game. My shoulder isn’t too bad, but it’s also not great—which makes sense considering the results of the scan say I need surgery on it.
Something I won’t consider until I get this last World Championship under my belt. The doctor hated my refusal to do it right now. I don’t think Summer liked it much either, based on the way she pressed her lips together all tight. But at least she didn’t scold me about it.
She gets it.
For all she’s been through, she understands my drive to succeed. To persevere. To not be a victim of my circumstances. And rather than talking me out of it, she snapped at the doctor to stop treating me like a child.
Her voice was all hard and snippy and—
“Rhett Eaton. What. The. Fuck. Do you think you’re doing?”
Raspy. Just like that. I look up just in time to see her riding on my mount, in a flowy white dress and fucking snakeskin boots.
If her face was a little more Please fuck me, sir and a little less I’m going to kill you, I’d be hard at the mere sight of her.
“Walking home,” I reply with a wink. Something I realize she hates. The wink. I mentally add it to my list of ways to rile her up.
She glares at me. “That.” She points at the tractor.
“Oh. That. That’s just my brothers and I blowing off some steam.”
She halts the horse in front of me, body swaying gently with the horse beneath her. “That”—she points again—“is how three men in their thirties blow off some steam? Why can’t you just be a normal male idiot and make me endure chasing you around while you try to fuck all the buckle bunnies?”
I stare back at her, a little taken aback by her outburst. “Is that really what you’d prefer?”
Her bottom lip pushes out as she raises her chin. I watch the column of her throat move as she glares at me, but she says nothing, even as the seconds stretch between us.
I eventually shrug and drop my gaze. “It was more about the nostalgia. I’m sure Beau will deploy any day now. With the two of us doing what we do, we never know when it will be our last time getting up to criminal mischief together.”
She blinks at that. Like she hadn’t considered that we both have jobs that risk our lives. And then, she pats the expanse of the horse’s back behind the saddle while lifting one leg up to offer me the stirrup. “Get up, you big idiot.”
“You making me ride bitch, Princess?” I wedge a boot in the stirrup and swing myself up a little awkwardly.
“If the shoe fits,” she grumbles, urging the horse forward.
Instead of grabbing her waist, I slide my arms around her petite frame and cover her hands with my own. “I’ve got it.”
For a minute, her fingers clench tight, like she doesn’t want to let go. Of the reins, or the control, or all the tension in her limbs.
But then she sighs, and I feel her body soften against mine as we both sway in time with the swinging gait of our mount. She seems out of breath, just like the poor horse we’re riding.
“What did you do? Gallop into battle?”
“Not before reaming your brothers out. But yeah, I didn’t know what kind of trouble you’d be in. If you’d need help.”
She was rushing to help me. To be there for me.
Her fingers wrap around the horn of the saddle, and the blades of her shoulders brush against my chest. And I can’t help myself. I take the reins in one hand and slide the other across her front. Splaying my fingers out over her ribs.
“How’d that go over?” I say quietly, feeling her body shake as a shiver rushes through her.
Summer clears her throat. “Well, Cade just crossed his arms and glared at me. Beau looked like a kicked puppy. Oh, and I think your dad and Luke might have peed their pants from laughing so hard.”
A deep laugh rumbles in my chest, and I feel her push back into it, her back flush against my chest now as we crest another rolling foothill. It feels really fucking good holding her in the cage of my arms. She’s relaxed with me, and I get off on that.
Without even thinking, my thumb starts to move in a gentle circle against her waist. Rubbing up against the bottom seam of her bra through the airy cotton. “I guess you weren’t lying about being able to ride.”
Her response is to reach forward and trail her fingers over my fingers that hold the reins. I suck in a breath, surprised by her sudden boldness. Her touch is pure heat as the delicate pads of her fingers trace the silver ring on my finger. But whatever hypnotic state she was just in evaporates before my eyes, and she snatches her hand back.
She sits up a little straighter, pulling away incrementally.
“Sorry. Yeah, no. I was pretty good before my heart problems worsened. It’s how I met my best friend, Willa. It’s also why I should have known riding in this dress would have pinched my thighs to shit.” She shifts in the saddle.
I lean down and whisper into her ear, “Well, your chivalry is not lost on me,” which earns me a firm elbow in the ribs.
“Your stupidity is not lost on me. If you’d been caught, I’d be the one in shit. I’d be letting people down.”
“You ever get tired of living to please everyone else all the time? Doesn’t it get boring?” I joke with a playful nip to the lobe of her ear, but based on the way Summer tenses, she doesn’t see the humor.
“Let me off.” She shoves one of my arms from where it’s resting against hers.
“What?”
“Let. Me. Off.”
“Summer, I didn’t mean—“
“I know what you meant. And it’s just further proof that you don’t understand responsibility beyond what you want and what makes you feel good.”
I move my arm away, and she swings her leg over the horse’s lowered neck and slides off easily. I even get a flash of her lacy nude underwear as she goes, but I look away quickly. She’s clearly pissed, and it seems ungentlemanlike to ogle her while she tries to storm off.